Fertilisers - Foodrise

What's the problem?

Over the past 100 years, the ‘fossil fertiliser’ industry has disrupted the nitrogen cycle, harmed the climate and polluted our planet.

Synthetic nitrogen fertilisers – also known as fossil fertilisers to reflect their reliance on natural gas for their manufacture – are one of the biggest, yet widely overlooked, environmental issues within our food system.

In recent decades, the use of fossil fertilisers has skyrocketed. We now use twice as much as we actually need, yet production continues to grow unchecked.

Fossil fertilisers are a cheap way to promote plant growth, but their overuse — especially in crops grown for animal feed — is seriously harming our planet.

They create dead zones in our waterways, degrade our soils, and threaten public health. Meanwhile, they are fuelling a fossil-fuel-dependent, corporate-controlled food system that strips farmers and communities of their power to grow and control their own food.

It’s time to shift away from fossil-fuelled farming and towards a food system that benefits planetary health, food security, and biodiversity.

Growth in fossil fertiliser production

has increased nine-fold since 1961

Fertilisers release nitrous oxide

a potent greenhouse gas which is 300 times more powerful than CO2 in trapping heat in the atmosphere over a 100–year period.

Nitrogen use in agriculture has exceeded safe ecological limits across the world

particularly in Asia, Europe, and North America, indicating significant environmental risks.

Our solutions

We’re exposing how the fossil fertiliser industry has broken the planet’s nitrogen cycle, manipulated food policies to protect its profits, and spread harmful practices to the Global South.

We’re naming names, demanding accountability, and calling for reparations for the damage they’ve caused.

Our goal is clear: reduce nitrogen pollution by transforming how we farm and what we eat.

A shift toward plant-based diets, which are far more nitrogen-efficient than diets heavy in meat and dairy will reduce fossil fertiliser use, restore ecosystems, and help us build a food system that works for people and the planet.

By changing diets and improving land use, we can reduce nitrogen use and pollution — building a fairer, more resilient food system.

In Europe, 80% of nitrogen used in crops goes into growing feed for livestock, not food for people.

Our demands

Identify and hold accountable the corporations that are responsible for, and have benefited from, breaking the nitrogen cycle.
Regulation of the fossil fertiliser industry. Compulsory targets and mandatory reporting of the total emissions (including scope 3).
Restrict fossil fertiliser industry access to public subsidies for blue and green hydrogen and redirect public money towards plant-based production models.
Significantly decrease the number of animals farmed. This will reduce nitrogen inputs and increase nitrogen use efficiency.
Government to actively promote reducing consumption of meat and dairy. Plant-based diets require less land and smaller amounts of fossil fertilisers thus reducing energy dependency and increasing food and energy resilience.
Governments to urgently adopt ambitious nitrogen use strategies in line with national and international targets.